Epiphanies popping like soap bubbles

PETER GUINTAStaff Writer

Published Saturday, June 30, 2001

Peter Guintastaff biosend email

I'm fighting a persistent depression and reading ''The Island of the Day Before,'' by Umberto Eco, an Italian novelist, and the book has gotten me thinking about the rare but wonderful bursts of clarity and understanding called epiphanies.

I love diving into a story, especially when I am depressed, because the bothersome world I'm in disappears and a new one magically opens. And in this unusual tale, Roberto LaGriva, a young Spanish nobleman of the 1600s, becomes thrown into the sea after his ship sinks in the Pacific.

Roberto is the only survivor and floats on a plank until he finds another ship anchored between two islands. He climbs aboard and soon learns that the ship is a Dutch schooner, but its crew is gone.

So, a mystery. Food and water are in the hold, but Roberto cannot sail a schooner alone. He must wait for help, spending his time examining life in retrospect.

He is a good person, interested in learning, love and family. But reflection recalls a dark double who has shadowed him always. This being, who looks exactly like Roberto, has entangled him into great difficulties, destroyed his reputation, seduced and abandoned a woman Roberto loves, and framed him as a spy, resulting in a death sentence.

Thus Roberto's flight to the Pacific.

I don't know if Roberto and his evil twin, Ferrante, are the same person, because I'm not finished reading the book yet. But at one point I realized that the mistakes or sins of anyone's past, if seen in sum and not balanced by good works or blessings, present a barely recognizable picture of that person.

I am a two-sided coin, light and dark. It's not a big epiphany, but it made me reflective. So those kind of thoughts keep me busy as I fight both a feeling of unease and Bridge of Lions traffic, sitting in a line of 30 other drivers late for work, burning gas for 20 minutes while one retiree in a sailboat putters through at 2 miles an hour.

But who can hold it against the guy? I'd trade places in a heartbeat.

Maybe I shouldn't look backward and regret those times I didn't travel and had the chance: Australia in 1969, but I chose Bangkok instead. Rhodesia in 1980, but the kids. Nicaragua in 1984, same reason. China, Korea and Russia in 1996. Lost my courage to leave, then met a girl. End of story.

The bridge moves back down. And yeah, the wait really wasn't that bad, the view and breezes were spectacular and WFCF was playing cool rock.

And traffic everywhere else -- Jacksonville, St. Petersburg, Tampa -- is so much worse.

So you think: I'm really glad to be in St. Augustine.

On a trip to Miami recently, I stepped from a hotel to cross Lejeune Road, and suddenly drivers seemed to aim their cars right at me. Thought it might have been my clothes (shorts, t-shirt) or age (old and slow).

But on the way home, I felt better. The passenger train was quiet and smooth and breeds self-reflection. Seats are wide, there's legroom and I could go across country on a train and love every mile.

So maybe if I try to keep from falling into the same old ruts with friends and family, throw on the running clothes once in a while, write some fiction stories and get some new music, moss won't grow on my soul and Ferrante won't find me.